Sydney Symphony Orchestra Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor designate, Vladimir Ashkenazy, returns to Sydney after last year's sell-out concerts to conduct the Sydney Symphony's third composer festival of 2007, the Rachmaninov Festival.
For just over two weeks in November, audiences will hear why Maestro Ashkenazy is considered one of the world's foremost interpreters of Rachmaninov's music and why critics have described his Rachmaninov performances as "magnificent and fiery" (The Australian, 2006).
Over nine performances, the Sydney Symphony and Maestro Ashkenazy will take audiences on a journey through Rachmaninov's major orchestral works including his three symphonies and three of his piano concertos with a performance by American pianist Garrick Ohlsson of the Piano Concerto No.3, made famous in the movie 'Shine'
Maestro Ashkenazy has been associated with Rachmaninov's music all his life, from his early years in Moscow to his intuitive performances and recordings as a conductor and pianist.
He once commented in an interview for andante.com: "Any time is a good time to revisit Rachmaninov. He was a great composer with tremendous inventiveness and substantial validity. The idea of a festival is to celebrate the great achievement of a great composer, and to give him his due."
"My passion for Rachmaninov started as long ago as I can remember. Somewhere deep inside me there is a certain subliminal feeling that Rachmaninov's music is a nutshell of the most elemental characteristics of the Russian soul. His music takes me by the throat and heart," said Ashkenazy.
Audiences too will be moved when Rachmaninov's music, some of the most opulent, virtuosic and unabashedly romantic music ever penned, sounds out across the concert hall stage.
Rachmaninov's life would be the perfect subject for a glamorous black and white movie. Born during the last flowering of Imperial Russia but ending his days as a celebrity in Beverley Hills, Rachmaninov was the greatest pianist of his age and a composer of genius.
Overcoming strife, both personal and political, Rachmaninov became one of the most famous musicians of the 20th century. Now, the charisma he had on the concert stage lives on in his stunning symphonies and concertos with their soaring lyrical melodies and evocative colours.
Performing alongside the Orchestra will be four outstanding guest pianists, each hand-picked by Maestro Ashkenazy for their technical and expressive expertise: Cristina Ortiz, Kazune Shimizu, Lukáš Vondráček and Garrick Ohlsson.
For Shimizu, Vondráček and Ohlsson, these Rachmaninov performances will mark their debuts with the Sydney Symphony while Cristina Ortiz returns to the Opera House concert hall stage after an absence of 15 years. -- www.sydneysymphony.com
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